Finau powers through conditions to maintain lead in Houston

HOUSTON – As Tony Finau walked off Memorial Park’s 18th green, a handful of the fans brave enough to endure the falling temperatures at the end of a brisk fall day started chanting, “Let’s go, Tony!”

The people of Houston, still riding the excitement of the Astros’ World Series win last week, appreciate a winner. They knew they were looking at the man who seems likely to be hoisting the Cadence Bank Houston Open’s trophy on Sunday alongside Orbit, the mascot for the city’s victorious baseball team.

The question no longer is “Can Tony Finau win?” It’s “Can Tony Finau be stopped?”

Beginning Saturday’s third round with a four-shot lead, Finau played a near-flawless round in difficult conditions to make Sunday an opportunity to marvel at an incredible run.

Finau will begin the final round of the Cadence Bank Houston Open at 15 under par (65-62-68) after a bogey-free round on a cold and windy Saturday. This was just the second time in his 748 career rounds on TOUR that he hit every fairway in a round. He missed just two greens, as well. One of those came on No. 18, where he holed a 9-foot par putt to maintain the four-shot advantage he began the day with. It may have been the most stressful stroke of the week.

Finau has looked to be in complete control otherwise. He leads the field in driving accuracy this week and is second in greens hit, as well.

“I hit the driver as good as I've ever hit it,” he said,

A win Sunday would be Finau’s third in his last seven starts after he won back-to-back weeks in July to double his career victory total in a single fortnight. He won the 3M Open by three and the Rocket Mortgage Classic by five and has the opportunity to run up another large margin Sunday (Tom Kim is the only other player with multiple wins of three-plus shots since the start of last season).

“Winning just breeds confidence,” Finau said. “I've always felt like I was confident to win, but you've got to do it, you've got to make it happen. Having done that back-to-back (in July), I think it just breeds confidence more into my belief and to my game.”

Ben Taylor, who’s in second at 11 under, is the only player within a half-dozen shots of Finau. Former FedExCup champ Justin Rose, Wyndham Clark and Tyson Alexander are tied for third at 8 under par. Rose is the only one among Finau’s four closest pursuers with a PGA TOUR win.

“It’s all in Tony's hands,” said Rose.

Finau has the preternatural gifts that are a prerequisite to sustained stretches of success. His physique is an outlier on the PGA TOUR, a 6-foot-4 frame with long levers that efficiently apply explosive force to a golf ball. For Finau, fulfilling his promise has come from reigning in his incredible power.

His performance this week has shown his ability to adapt to a variety of conditions. Finau has the firepower to go low – he was 43 under in his back-to-back wins this summer – and thrive in the toughest conditions. He has nine top-10s in majors over the last five years.

On Friday, he didn’t need to make a putt longer than 15 feet to shoot a 62 that tied the course record and put him four shots ahead of the field. Of his 10 birdies, six came on putts of 5 feet or less. The average length of those 10 birdie putts made was 6.2 feet.

The round was impressive enough for playing partner Mackenzie Hughes to joke that, “Tony had a long pro-am day today.” Finau dusted the other two members of his group, Hughes and Joel Dahmen, by a half-dozen shots each.

When the weather worsened Saturday, Finau buckled down and displayed supreme control of his ball.

“That was a really good round,” Finau said about his play Saturday. “I think the score doesn't say that, but I think I played better than yesterday. You know, yesterday I shot 62, but today that 68 I thought was pretty impressive for the conditions.”

Sunday’s forecast calls for more of the same, with a high of just 59 degrees.

A win this week would be Finau’s fourth in his last 30 starts on TOUR, as well, dating back to the opener of last year’s FedExCup Playoffs. It would tie him with the reigning FedExCup champ (Rory McIlroy) and PGA TOUR Player of the Year (Scottie Scheffler) for the most in that span.

Finau’s win to begin last year’s FedExCup Playoffs ended nearly 2,000 days of waiting since his first TOUR win, and not for a lack of opportunities. He recorded 39 top-10s in the 142 starts between his first and second wins, including eight runners-up.

Those days are long gone, however. Sunday provides another opportunity to show that.